Trying too hard to understand something prevents one from appreciating just how interesting and/or beautiful it really is. Appreciation is a ''feeling'', not a [[EverybodyHatesMathematics number]]! Reducing the divinely incomprehensible to the mundanely complex isn't just tedious and hard — it's fundamentally ''wrong''.

At its heart this trope is a reaction against hyper-intellectualism; a fear and frustration of someone assigning a number or a scientific name to everything from rainbows to emotions. It could be summed up as "put away your calculator and enjoy the beautiful sunrise". This trope is for those that respond "it's nothing special; just an optical illusion".

It can appear anti-intellectual because it has the UnfortunateImplications of implying that only people that don't know anything about a subject can appreciate it. Naturally, experts of the given subject are repulsed by this idea. Their ''understanding'' is never questioned, just their ability to appreciate it. Nobody has ever, for instance, advocated fielding [[GeneralFailure Generals who know absolutely nothing about planning, logistics, strategy, or tactics but feel like they have deep psycho-spiritual connections with warfare]]. It's only when the AbstractScale comes into play that arguments start.

An expert that fully understands and appreciates their field is aversion of this trope. In fact, such an expert can be an ''inversion''. In other words, their understanding increases their appreciation instead of decreasing it. For example, one can marvel at both the visual beauty of a rainbow ''in addition to'' being in awe of the complex and delicate interplay of factors that allows it to exist.

This is a major gripe that [[RomanticismVersusEnlightenment Romanticism has against Enlightenment]]. Related to StrawVulcan, HollywoodAtheist, and MotherNatureFatherScience, since this kind of character is almost AlwaysMale. One manifestation of this is DontExplainTheJoke. Compare CentipedesDilemma, and DontThinkFeel.

Contrast AntiNihilist, AwesomenessByAnalysis, EnlightenmentSuperpowers, EmotionSuppression, GeekyTurnOn, and especially TheWorldIsJustAwesome for all the beauty missed by those who cannot see the pretty numbers in the page image.

Has nothing to do with the OtakuSurrogate character from ''Webcomic/QuestionableContent'', or with the film ''The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-In-The-Moon Marigolds''.

----!!Examples:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]* ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'' Edward Elric is usually a straight example but his stance is ultimately complicated. ** He used it to justify his anti-god stance in the first story arc, . 'Alchemists are scientists, so we don't believe in vague things like God. [[{{Naytheist}} He hates me, incidentally.]]' ** It's taken to one extreme in the final chapter/episode, where Ed turns [[spoiler: '''''a marriage proposal''''']] into a discussion about the properties of alchemy, which Winry lampshades by calling him out on.** Immediately after a baby is born, his reaction is to scream "That's awesome! LIFE IS AWESOME!!!,". Instead of talking about chemicals or instinctions or anything like that.** In one of the ''omakes''.--> '''Mei Chan''': Birds are so lucky...they can fly wherever they want, I wish I could be a bird.--> '''Edward''': A bird? That's lame. If you were a bird, you'd have flimsy hollow bones, and your brain would be the size of a pea. Not to mention the fact that you would be constantly crapping in mid-air to keep your weight down. Why would you want to be an animal like that?--> '''Mei Chan''': Mr. Edward, you're not very popular with girls, are you?--> '''Edward''': That's ridiculous! How could an ''intellectual'' like me not be popular!* In ''Manga/{{Yotsuba}}'', Asagi shows Yotsuba that the ''tsukitsukiboushi'' making the onomatopoetic chirps heard in late-summer are cicadas, and not summer-ending fairies as she believed. However, Yotsuba is excited to learn something new and eagerly spreads the word that [[ShapedLikeItself cicadas are cicadas!]]* Hajime in ''Manga/ICantUnderstandWhatMyHusbandIsSaying'' lists off the tired plot and clichés in a movie he just saw, while his wife stands there, saying she enjoyed it and is bewildered that someone would even think about stuff like that. Semi justified, since he was going to post a review on his blog later.[[/folder]]

[[folder:Comic Books]]* One ComicBook/FantasticFour story had a villain steal not the intelligence, but the creativity of Reed Richards, who is regarded as one of the most intelligent men in the MarvelUniverse. He found himself shocked to discover that he couldn't even stare at a flower without being hit by the sheer sense of wonder Richards feels at the existence of all things!* ''Comicbook/{{Watchmen}}''** Dr. Manhattan finds wonder in such miracles as the bonding of atoms and the formation of mountains and continents, but doesn't hold any regard for life itself (mostly because he thinks he knows everything life has to offer). In fact, he only starts to love life again when he analyzes just ''how'' completely and utterly ''improbable'' (to the point of it almost being a statistical impossibility) daily life is.** Dan Dreiburg, AKA Nite Owl II, mentions this effect in passing in one of the supplemental pieces. He found he was losing his awe for owls in studying them, until a chance encounter with a hunting owl brought his fascination back.* ''GreenLantern'': Krona is in love with this trope. Coupled with his trademark impatience, it has led him to stumble on disaster after disaster because, unlike the aversions below, he ''insists'' on quantifying and qualifying everything, and is ''especially'' devoted to having a meaningful conversation with the sentience of the universe. The few times he's granted his wish, he is chided for his simplistic approach and rebuffed for his ignorance.[[/folder]]

[[folder:Fan Works]]* ''DeptHeavenApocrypha'' has [[StudentCouncilPresident Ledah]], a workaholic [[SuperOCD overachiever]] with [[TheStoic all the apparent emotional capacity of a brick wall]]. Slowly, it's been revealed that this is more a result of his walled-in emotional problems and history of being abused than anything else, as he displays quite childish wonder at something so simple as realizing he has a friend.* In the [[FanficRecs/HaruhiSuzumiya fanfic]] ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5713033/1/The_Conflicts_of_Haruhi_Suzumiya The Conflicts of Haruhi Suzumiya]]'' there is a scene where Ryoko is watching the rain, explaining all the ways she can analyse it. She ends with, "It's beautiful. The more I find out, the more I feel I can appreciate how special everything really is."* In ''TabletopGame/GeniusTheTransgression'', a fan-made RPG about playing {{Mad Scientist}}s in the ''TabletopGame/NewWorldOfDarkness'', this sort of behavior is associated with plummetting down the KarmaMeter. It becomes quite horrific due to its being combined with an increasing disinterest in humans as anything other than [[HumanResources spare parts or test subjects]]. One of the given examples of a low-Obligation Genius has him trapping someone in a restraining machine and [[FacialHorror peeling off their face]] to watch the way their muscles work more easily, hooking them up to a machine that keeps them alive through this only while he's interested in his study.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Film-Live Action]]* In the Sherlock Holmes films staring Creator/RobertDowneyJr, he's shown to be doing the SherlockScan at all times ''instinctively'', not even trying. He's also shown to be enraptured by the sciences (especially forensics) and CAN see and enjoy the beauty in the world around him. He just likes reducing it to the bare facts to tweak those around him, especially Watson.[[/folder]]

[[folder:Literature]]* ''Literature/SherlockHolmes'' is a PlayingWithATrope. He was always complaining about how Watson kept writing the adventures in a dramatic fashion rather than focusing on the meaningful facts but he has his own flair for the dramatic. He claims he only has useful and practical information in his head and yet he is fascinated by those fields he deems practical.** The first time Watson met Holmes in ''A Study in Scarlet'', he was in the middle of an ecstatic nerdgasm as he'd just invented (the ancestor of) luminol.** In "The Valley of Fear" he laid a trap for the villain and kept his associates in the dark about what he was doing ''specifically'' because it was more dramatic that way.** In "The Red-Headed League", he stops by an "artificial kneecap factory" (yes, really) and asks the man there some inane questions. When Watson chides him for wasting time, he responds that he was only asking the questions so he'd have an excuse to look at the man's knees. Watson asked what he saw, and Holmes responded "Exactly what I expected to see." At the meta level, explaining in detail what that was would have killed most of the mystery of the story too soon; in universe, he seems to be doing it just to be a dick to Watson.** In "The Lion's Mane," Holmes admits that Watson's storytelling is needed to fully engage the reader's interest rather than a straightforward depiction of cold facts.* The character Dee Dee Six in the Philip Ridley book ''MightyFizzChilla'' is like this. At one point she says things like food don't matter to her beyond nutritional value - she could eat a banquet or take some vitamin pills and it would be the same to her.* Creator/MarkTwain** The man wrote an essay "Two Ways of Seeing a River" devoted to this very {{trope}}. Read it [[http://grammar.about.com/od/60essays/a/twowaysessay.htm here]].** He also famously put in the preface to ''Literature/HuckleberryFinn'':--->“Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in will be shot.--->BY ORDER OF THE AUTHOR--->per G.G., CHIEF OF ORDNANCE” * ''HomoFaber'', the well-known novel by Max Frisch, has exactly this type of guy as the protagonist-narrator.* The Creator/WaltWhitman poem "[[http://quotations.about.com/cs/poemlyrics/a/When_I_Heard_Th.htm When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer]]" is about the narrator becoming bored at a astronomer's facts and figures and going outside to look at the stars.** Creator/EdgarAllanPoe's takes what's implicit in the poem and [[TakeThat makes it explicit]] in ''[[http://www.sonnets.org/poe.htm#100 To Science]]''.** A scientist's rebuttal to Walt Whitman's pome is called "[[http://www.scottaaronson.com/writings/whitman.html When I Heard the Learn'd Poet]]"* Creator/EECummings** [[http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~richie/poetry/html/poem162.html "since feeling is first"]] includes lines like "who pays attention to the syntax of things will never wholly kiss you" and "kisses are a better fate than wisdom".** [[http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/o-sweet-spontaneous-v/ "o sweet spontaneous"]] is more obviously and scathingly against this.* ''Literature/{{Discworld}}''** The Auditors fall into this whenever they're not trying to destroy things ''because'' they can't be measured using numbers. At one point they attempted to understand art by reducing a painting to powder and sifting through to find the bit of it that was the art.** ''Discworld/{{Hogfather}}'' Death says you could grind the universe to a powder and not find one atom of "truth" or "justice", and in ''The Science of Discworld'' it's noted that you could do the same and not find one atom of "science".** In ''Discworld/SmallGods'', Brutha is shown some color illustrations of plant life at the Library of Ephebe, in a book about the useful qualities of plants. Deeply moved by the images, he remarks "they're beautiful...", and the fellow who's showing him the book replies that that's one use the book's author had entirely overlooked.** [[CloudCuckoolander Twoflower]] has shades of this; Rincewind once described him as the sort of person who, upon seeing a daffodil, would run off to get a botany book and not realize he'd trodden on the daffodil.** In ''Discworld/TheScienceOfDiscworld'', Stewart and Cohen use the example in the {{trope}} description; pointing out that understanding how rainbows work doesn't stop them being beautiful; it means you know ''why'' they're beautiful. In fact Ian Stewart, like most mathematicians, uses the word "beautiful" a ''lot'' and a particularly well-executed proof is often referred to as "elegant".** There's a subtle aversion in ''The Wee Free Men''. Tiffany muses that you can spend all day studying the many intricate parts and complexities of a simple flower--rather than thinking that this takes away the beauty in any way, she concludes that it's not practical to become utterly fascinated by the beauty when you have butter to churn.%%* [[http://www.echoschildren.org/CDlyrics/WORDGOD.HTML The Word of God]] * Creator/JohnKeats, ''Lamia'':-->...Do not all charms fly\\At the mere touch of cold philosophy?\\There was an awful rainbow once in heaven:\\We know her woof, her texture; she is given\\In the dull catalogue of common things.\\Philosophy will clip an Angel's wings,\\Conquer all mysteries by rule and line,\\Empty the haunted air, and gnomed mine—\\Unweave a rainbow...* Creator/HenrikWergeland played with this all the time: --> Look closely, are you to view the greatness in the small, see divine thoughts heighten from the pale grass...** Wergeland believed in the cause of enlightenment and science, but that never hindered him from gasping in wonder over the smallest objects and creatures of creation. * In ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'', Gandalf calls out Saruman over this. Specifically, it's a big part of what reveals to Gandalf that Saruman [[FaceHeelTurn has betrayed them]].--> '''Gandalf''': He that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom.* The short story ''Democritus's Violin'' is about this trope. An academic windbag gets angry at the main character for using science in an essay on Bach and she gets back at him by pulling a prank which (supposedly) proves that [[FamilyUnfriendlyAesop the world is strictly reductionist and any belief in the power of art is the product of a dim mind]]. * In ''Literature/BreakfastOfChampions'', there's a scene where [[MakesSenseInContext the author]] is attacked by a dog. Creator/KurtVonnegut spends two full pages on a ridiculously detailed and brilliantly dramatic explanation of what happens biochemically in his nervous system, body and brain from the time he sees the dog until he [[CrowningMomentOfAwesome jumps over a car]].* In the novelization of ''BuckarooBanzai'' by Earl Max Rauch, Dr. Banzai is clearly a man who finds beauty in science and learning. An early passage states that his guiding principles in life are "The Five Stresses, The Four Beauties and the Three Loves". The Five Stresses(things which are to be stressed in life) are decorum, courtesy, public health, discipline and morals. The Four Beauties are Mind, Language, Behavior and Environment. The Three Loves are Love of Others, Love of Justice and Love of Freedom.* [[Creator/RichardDawkins Richard Dawkins]] wrote "Unweaving the Rainbow" about this idea and went to great lengths to show how understanding the underlying rules and processes behind everyday objects adds layers of fascination and beauty rather than taking them away.

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Live-Action TV]]* ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode "This Side of Paradise". Mr. Spock has been affected by spores that release his emotional side. He and his love interest Leila Kalomi are looking at clouds.-->'''Spock:''' That one looks like a dragon. You see the tail and the dorsal spines?\\'''Leila:''' I've never seen a dragon.\\'''Spock:''' I have. On Berengaria 7. But I've never stopped to look at clouds before. Or rainbows. I can tell you exactly why one appears in the sky, but considering its beauty has always been out of the question.** Even when he's in his normal modus operandi, what is his common CatchPhrase?--> Fascinating!* ''Series/{{House}}'' ** Being essentially a Literature/SherlockHolmes {{expy}}, House is frequently dismissive of human emotions and relationships. On the other hand he rides a motorcycle, takes a sadistic pleasure in artistic pranks, and does all sorts of other things just for fun. He doesn't ''look'' any happier, but they presumably do something for him.** House also said, in a season 4 episode, "If the wonder's gone when the truth is known, there never was any wonder to begin with."* A running theme on ''Series/{{Scrubs}}'' involves the characters gradually becoming more and more jaded to the practice of medicine. For instance, when Turk is sued by a patient, [[DrJerk Dr. Cox]] takes it upon himself to "crush his spirit," a process that culminates with Cox explaining to Turk and a roomful of [[LittlestCancerPatient sick children]] how a magician's "rabbit in the hat" trick works.* ''Series/CriminalMinds'': Reid has a habit of doing this. While he is excited about his scientific and statistical information he can bring to the current conversation, he usually sucks all the awe and emotion out of it for everyone else involved. It's something of an inversion, since to him the details are as wondrous as the initial impression but everyone else sees it as dry and boring.* ''Series/DoctorWho''- The Doctor himself is a complicated example because [[TheNthDoctor it depends on The Doctor]]. In some cases, this trope is part of the reason that the Doctor takes human companions with him; they can experience awe in his place because they don't understand the wonders of the universe. In other cases, the Doctor displays a boundless, childlike fascination with everything precisely because of his capacity to understand it, and excitedly tries to explain to his companions because he wants them to share in the wonder he sees. ** A ''BigFinishDoctorWho'' Companion Chronicle reveals that the First Doctor had submitted a pretentious and childish paper to the Academy proving that love did not exist and was just a series of chemicals. His tutor yelled at him for missing the point.** The Third Doctor's "the [[BuffySpeak daisy-est]] daisy I ever saw" speech in which he describes an epiphany he had of how desperately beautiful simple flowers are just by virtue of being there. ** Much of the NightmareFetishist behaviour of the Tenth stems from his appreciation of ''how'' the [[AdmiringTheAbomination horrible monster]] goes about doing whatever horrible thing it does. ** Then there's this quote showing The Doctor's fatigue. -->'''The Doctor:''' Because I can't see it any more. I'm 907. After a while, you just can't see it. Everything. I look at a star, and it's just a big ball of burning gas, and I know how it began, and I know how it ends, and I was probably there both times. Now, after a while, everything is just stuff. That's the problem, you make all of space and time your backyard and what do you have? A backyard. But you, you can see it, and when you see it, I see it.* In ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'', after the titular detective rants about all of the useless information in the world, and how he only keeps important things on his "hard drive" (i.e. his brain), John more or less accuses him of taking this approach to life. Later Sherlock comments on the beauty of the night sky, and John is shocked.-->'''Sherlock:''' ''(looking at the stars)'' "Beautiful isn't it?"-->'''John:''' "I thought you didn't care about-"-->'''Sherlock:''' "Doesn't mean I can't appreciate it."* In an episode of ''Series/{{Sliders}}'', when an android explained to Wade why the sky is blue, and she found it romantic.* ''Series/{{NUMB3RS}}'' : Charlie Eppes is a math genius who sees incredible and fascinating beauty in how mathematics helps describe the world. Indeed, he gets very emotional and passionate when talking about math but he does not enjoy ''stage magic'' because he so easily comprehends how the tricks are done. His girlfriend, on the other hand (who is also a mathematician), loves magic, and {{lampshade|Hanging}}s this very {{Trope}} in pointing out that understanding how it's done doesn't have to detract from the enjoyment.* Creator/CarlSagan's ''Series/CosmosAPersonalVoyage'' is, in its entirety, a repudiation of this {{Trope}}. In fact, it might be seen as espousing the opposite - seeing as you are made of trillions of highly evolved cells equipped with ludicrously complex molecular machinery, the components of which, as well as nearly everything else, were made from the ashes of long-dead stars, that we can transcend time and death by reading... The most mundane events are suddenly much more profound and wonderful. As Carl Sagan once said, it takes away nothing of the romance of a sunset if you know a bit about how it works.** The 2014 reboot, hosted by NeilDeGrasseTyson, carries on with the same tone, especially in the final episode, which takes notes from Sagan's book ''The Demon-Haunted World'' in urging the public to become scientifically literate as a means to improve their lives. At one point he explains how examining growth layers in manganese nodules from the sea floor provides evidence of the earth being scoured by a supernova explosion two million years ago. "The difference between seeing just a pebble, and being able to read the history of the cosmos inscribed within... is science."* Jacob Bronowski's ''The Ascent Of Man'' is described by CharlieBrooker as being like "taking a warm bath in University juice."* ''Into The Universe with StephenHawking'' is a show on space and time that's framed as a peek into the titular physicist's mind. It is gorgeous in there.* The Swedes were lucky to have Peter Nilson, author and astronomer, who wrote beautifully about such things as the heat death of the universe, and didn't let his knowledge of acoustics spoil his love of music or of ecohistory spoil his love of the Swedish countryside - he wrote books on both, as well as science fiction novels.* ''{{CSI}}'': has s an episode where Catherine chides Gil Grissom for wanting to know how magic tricks work.%%* ''Series/JonathanCreek''.* Inverted on ''NorthernExposure'': Ed Chigliak, MagicalNativeAmerican, artist, and {{bishonen}}, hates computers, until he realizes that ones and zeros are just like his people's view that the universe is made up of two things: Nothing, and everything.* Rarely explicitly stated, but in ''BigBangTheory'', the {{Nerd}}s - even Sheldon on occasion - are amazed at the beauty and wonder that exists around them and quickly point out that there's amazing things that you wouldn't even know existed without the aid of science - Astronomy appears to be their poison of choice.* On ''Fool Us'', [[Creator/PennAndTeller Penn Jillette]] frequently says that he and Teller enjoyed a trick more than the audience because they knew how it was done and could fully appreciate the skill with which a piece of sleight of hand was done. They can show how they do the cup and balls trick with see through cups and a base, and you will still be amazed at how they did it. They move so fast it might as well be magic.* {{Bones}}: Temperance Brennan has [[SesquipedalianLoquaciousness a unique means]] of appraising Seely Booth's appearance;-->'''Brennan''': Booth has a bigger mandible and a more prominent zygomatic than Fisher, as well as a more pronounced ratio between the width of his clavicles and his ilia.\\'''Angela''': So, it's because Booth is hot? Now we're getting somewhere.[[/folder]]

[[folder:Meta]]* TvTropes itself. ** We have a page called TvTropesWillRuinYourLife because, after a long WikiWalk, you'll start seeing {{Trope}}s every time you watch a {{film}} and they'll distract you from enjoying the {{plot}}. You become jaded and unable to appreciate a work in any medium by automatically dissecting and analyzing it.** We have a page called TvTropesWillEnhanceYourLife because spotting tropes and admiring how an author built a story is part of your enjoyement of the story. Better yet, it gives you the tools to analyze and explain to others why you liked or did not like a piece rather than relying on "Eh, I just didn't like it."** Research complaints*** On one hand, pointing out research failures is usually because of a demand for accuracy rather than for intrinsic entertainment. ArtisticLicense, RuleOfCool[=/=]RuleOfFun[=/=]whatever, will often be dismissed as 'the easy way out', neglecting the fact that good fiction uses these {{trope}}s just as often as bad fiction. It's ''fictional'' - there's no prizes for getting every detail correct. They don't seem to get that TropesAreNotBad, and that we're here to ''celebrate'' popular fiction. Indeed, half of the Wiki is now AwesomeMoments, FunnyMoments, HeartwarmingMoments and their kin, which is basically the internet's repository of stuff people like just because they like it.*** On the other hand, bad research is harmful to the WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief of readers who are familiar with the given aspect of reality; one author shares, as part of explaining why [[ShownTheirWork research matters]], the tale of having the ending of a werewolf horror story shatter for a reader who happened to know that an [=EMT=] would be better at treating the hero's injuries than a doctor at that point. The advice is essentially that picking your breaks from reality is good use of ArtisticLicense.* [[http://blog.toonzone.net/blogs/39/crowning-moment-of-annoyance--tv-tropes/ This blog entry]] -- the last paragraph directly accuses TVTropes of ruining fiction:-->But the heart of the problem is that TVTropes takes good, challenging fiction and removes its identity as an individual piece of work. ... Nothing more quickly removes the fun and charm of something born from human emotion and creativity than to strip it down into cold and clinical statistics presented out of context.* This is basically what people who study {{Literature}}, music, art, etc. do for a living, and just like the science examples, just try going up to a {{Literature}} professor and telling them that their understanding of the mechanics of plot, characterization, themes, and wordplay means they do not feel the same spark of wonder. A good example is Shakespearean comedies - before studying them and their context, you'll get about a tenth of the jokes. Some people think that the guy laughing on his own in the theatre is showing off, because as DontExplainTheJoke suggests, you can't genuinely enjoy a joke that's been explained to you.* The author of [[http://www.aycyas.com/ And You Call Yourself A Scientist]], picking apart movie pseudoscience, says something about this in her [[http://www.aycyas.com/jurassicpark.htm examination]] of ''Franchise/JurassicPark''.-->You know, whenever I post one of these dissectory reviews, the first consequence is always, always, that someone will send me an e-mail demanding, [[MoffsLaw "Why do you have to think so much about the films you watch? Why can’t you just enjoy them? Why do you get so upset?"]] Given the implication that "thinking" and "enjoying yourself" are necessarily mutually exclusive, it is perhaps not surprising that they rarely believe me when I say that such an exercise gives me a great deal of pleasure; that the process of putting a film under the microscope (ha, ha) adds considerably to my whole experience of it – and that’s true whether I ultimately endorse or criticize its science.* The creators of ''WebVideo/ExtraCredits'' say they frequently receive comments saying that by analyzing games they are sucking the fun out of them. Their response can be found [[http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/art-is-not-the-opposite-of-fun here]].

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Music]]* The song ''[[Music/InsaneClownPosse Miracles]]'' angrily renounces anything scientific, instead referring to natural processes as "miracles", such as [[MundaneMadeAwesome feeding pelicans]] and [[MemeticMutation the workings of magnets]]. ** Magnets - [[http://memebase.cheezburger.com/artoftrolling/tag/mormon-chat Mormons have got you covered]]** The [[Series/SaturdayNightLive SNL]] parody "Magical Mysteries" takes things even further, featuring lines like "What is Alaska? Who is Brazil? [[InsaneTrollLogic Isn't a volcano just an angry hill?]]"** ''WebVideo/LoadingReadyRun'' made a full [[http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/loadingreadyrun/1629-Scientists-Rebuttal-to-ICP rebuttal.]]* Music/{{Coldplay}}'s song "The Scientist":-->''I was just guessing at numbers and figures''\\''Pulling the puzzles apart''\\''Questions of science, science and progress''\\''Do not speak as loud as my heart''* Many a music teacher has suggested to his or her pupils that they dedicate time to learn basic music theory, as it will help them write music. Nearly as many music teachers have been saddened to hear their students claim that they "don't want to learn a bunch of rules that [they] have to follow." This is incorrect, because it assumes that music theory is a set of rules that must be followed. When told that music theory is more a way to analyze the writing and composition of music, these pupils are usually dismissive, citing, to some degree or another, this trope. If you haven't heard of the rules, you've also never asked yourself questions such as: "Am I already following these rules? Should I be? What is each rule trying to prevent? How do people get away with breaking each rule?" Music theory is to writing music as a map is to wandering; you can still put it away and enjoy the scenery. Having one just helps you know if you're going in circles, and lets you reach places far enough away from your home that you wouldn't have stumbled upon them otherwise. What's sad is that this preception might have held back the musical talents of many ''many'' budding musicians.* Tom Glazer wrote "Why Does The Sun Shine? (The Sun Is a Mass of Incandescent Gas)" in 1959. The long-forgotten song was later covered by Music/TheyMightBeGiants, and their children's educational CD "Here Comes Science" includes [[ScienceMarchesOn an updated version]], "Why Does the Sun Really Shine? (The Sun is a Miasma of Incandescent Plasma)". Justified in that these songs are meant to both educate and entertain, ([[CrowningMusicOfAwesome and do both splendidly]]).* As a judge on ''Series/TheSingOff'', Music/BenFolds is enjoying the show on more levels than the rest of us as he elaborates the exact technical merits of each performance. He looks giddy as he explains how the three-part harmony comes together or points out the arrangement of events every four to eight bars.* RiloKiley's song "Science Vs. Romance" possibly references this-->''I used to think, if I could realize I'd die, then I would be a lot nicer,", "Used to believe, in a lot more. Now I just see straight ahead", but it's about a scientist trying to regain his feelings again, evidenced by the line "Facts vs. romance, you go and call yourself the boss, but we're not robots inside a grid."''* Music/FlamingLips songs from the "Clouds Taste Metalic" and "The Soft Bulletin" era, are often ocuppied with demonstrating the beauty that lies between emotions and chemistry. Most notably are When You Smile: "Every single molecule is right, when /All of the subatomic pieces come together/ and unfold themselves in a second" and the title of the song "What Is the Light?" ("An Untested Hypothesis Suggesting That the Chemical [In Our Brains] by Which We Are Able to Experience the Sensation of Being in Love Is the Same Chemical That Caused the "Big Bang" That Was the Birth of the Accelerating Universe"). * The Angel and Robot Show/Phenomenaut's [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdkPgZhNiqU It's Only Chemical]] flipflops between being played straight (You might think this song is special with the way it makes you feel, but it's not/It's only chemical) and being a subversion, as it also applies to the bad emotions you go through in life - and that emotions just being chemicals is a good thing (It's better that way).[[/folder]]

[[folder:Newspaper Comics]]* One ''{{BC}}'' character (probably Thor) neatly torpedoed his own chances of getting lucky by responding to a comment on the beauty of the moon rising by saying it's an illusion caused by the Earth's rotation. Cue him shouting at the retreating Cute Chick, "BUT IT IS STILL ROMANTIC, OH SOOOO ROMANTIC!" in a futile effort to recover the magic.* Referenced in the ''FoxTrot'' arc where Andy becomes obsessed with the film ''{{Titanic}}'', to the point that Roger worries about her. Jason begins describing production trivia to her ("Did you know the scenes with everyone drowning were filmed in a heated indoor pool, and their foggy breath was added by computers?" and so on). Andy accuses Jason of trying to ruin her enjoyment of the film. The final panel has Jason telling Roger, "She's onto us. Do I still get paid?"[[/folder]]

[[folder:Theater]]* Creator/PennAndTeller at one point had a part of their stage show in which Teller would climb into a complex contraption of interconnected boxes and poke his head and limbs out in various impossible-seeming configurations while Penn manipulated and rearranged the boxes, all set to music in a sort of magic-trick-cum-dance-routine. It was impressive but not so different from anything you'd see at a magic show. Then they turn the entire contraption around to show that its back side is transparent, and do the entire routine again so that the audience can see just exactly how much skill and dexterity the trick required, particularly from Teller. It was ''amazing.''* The musical adaptation of TheSnowQueen (no, not Disney/{{Frozen}}) has Kai, the boy taken by the queen, only find mathematical equations and numbers purer than his dirty city, rejecting the time he and Gerta (the protagonist) together as "childish" and dismissing her as "too stupid to understand". He's used by the Queen to solve mathematical equations: the biggest one of them all is solving eternity. Gerta brings him back from cold rationality with love, and [[spoiler:love is the answer to eternity.]][[/folder]]

[[folder:Tabletop Games]]* Overuse of this theme was one of the many criticisms leveled at the OldWorldOfDarkness games.** ''TabletopGame/MageTheAscension'' had the Technocracy, who started out as an evil conspiracy combining the worst features of ''Literature/NineteenEightyFour'', the Agents from ''Film/TheMatrix'', every GovernmentConspiracy ever, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking and]] [[EverybodyHatesMathematics an especially boring math class]]. (They receives a lot of CharacterDevelopment as the game-line went on.) ** ''ChangelingTheDreaming'' characters were vulnerable to "Banality", which in practice meant that inhaling while too close to an accountant could make their souls It was also [[DependingOnTheWriter inconsistent]] on this point, as for every book that treated a slide rule as just as bad as [[WeaksauceWeakness cold iron]], there was a source book where the [[MadScientist nockers]] pointed out it was the moon landing that resulted in the biggest rush of Glamour most changelings had seen in their lifetimes, or a sample [[{{Hobbits}} boggan]] ''accountant'' who resisted Banality through his profession because he took joy in numbers.** Averted in the following quote from the Second Edition of ''TabletopGame/MageTheAscension'', used to sum up the attitude of the Sons of Ether:-->"The beauty of science is not that it answers all the questions, but that with every answer, more questions arise."** Then there's the Weaver in ''TabletopGame/WerewolfTheApocalypse'', a cosmic force which is associated with both technological progress and stasis. While it tends to be perceived as a lesser threat than the obvious BigBad that is the Wyrm, many of the non-Glass Walker Garou continue to look down on things like cities or computers. ''Then'' it's further suggested that the origin of the entire CrapsackWorld can be traced back to the Weaver, since its imprisonment of the Wyrm was what drove it insane to begin with.* ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'': Early editions had comparatively fewer rules than later editions for character actions other than combat and spellcasting. Back then if, say, you wanted to throw your drink in a villain's face to blind him, jump from a balcony, [[ChandelierSwing swing on a chandelier]], somersault through the air, land on your feet, and run out of the room, your DM would have to figure out exactly how that would work - probably an attack roll with a small penalty, some Dexterity rolls, and a decision about whether you've generally played your character as a guy who would do that kind of thing. Now, your GM has extensive rules for how far you can jump, how far you can move, how much damage you take when you fall, what difficulty the Acrobatics check should be based on your level and if you don't have an attack power that blinds (or at least stuns or dazes) you can forget the drink-throwing having any useful effect. The new version makes everything much more standardized, predictable, easy to run, and fair, but many old-timers argue that the "rules instead of rulings" style of modern editions take all the heroism and excitement out of the game.** 4th Edition included a SPECIFIC list and a table, devoted to 'actions the rules don't cover'...So the GM can EASILY get a ruling for you doing cool shit. (Especially "I want to swing from a chandelier and hit them!") Unfortunately, this same table makes sure that "cool shit" will always be less effective than your default attacks, thus punishing people trying to be creative. The original DMG spelled out that players with original ideas should be "rewarded" for that with a lower chance of success.** 5th Edition appears to be heading back into the realm of simplicity over simulationism. If you want to try a cool stunt that's not explicitly outlined in the handbook, all the DM has to do is make up his/her mind on what sort of check is necessary, how difficult it ought to be given the circumstances, and then ask you to roll it. The designers of the edition even outright advocates "rulings over rules" in social media, an inversion of the phrase grognards use to describe the newer editions that preceded it.[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Comics]]* ''Webcomic/GunnerkriggCourt'', ** The animals of Gillitie Wood think that of the Court scientists' study of magic.** Conversely, many Court scientists feel that refusing to even attempt to explain how things work is a disservice to the beauty of their complexity.* ''Webcomic/AbstruseGoose'': [[http://abstrusegoose.com/275 This is how scientists see the world.]] The strip does not, however, carry this trope throughout.* ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}'' is a inversion of this. It often talks of math and science with an infectious sense of awe and giddiness, demonstrated [[http://xkcd.com/877/ here]].* Clinton from ''Webcomic/QuestionableContent'' inverts it, arguing that you can't truly appreciate the marigolds until you've measured them.[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Original]]* A number of Website/FundiesSayTheDarndestThings quotes question how scientifically minded people can feel love (whether towards a person, a concept or a deity) if they believe it to be a neurological process rather than metaphysical in nature; the usual response is that this knowledge doesn't change the way it feels.* MrDeity accused Lucifer of this when she explained to him that Penn & Teller don't really have magic powers.* Inverted by SymphonyOfScience which is nothing but various scientists [[{{Squee}} gushing]] about how awesome the world and its mechanics are, [[AutoTune Auto-Tuned]] and set to music.* EliezerYudkowsky argues against it under the title, "[[http://lesswrong.com/lw/oo/explaining_vs_explaining_away/ Explaining vs. Explaining Away]], with some follow up notes on taking [[http://lesswrong.com/lw/or/joy_in_the_merely_real/ Joy in the "Merely" Real]].* Sign up for a few skeptical and science podcasts, such as ''Podcast/{{Skeptoid}}'', TheSkepticsGuideToTheUniverse, or indeed any other. Sure, there may be the occasional attack on pseudoscience and alternative medicine, but most of the content is very bright people waxing lyrical about how cool a new discovery, newly realized aspect of the natural world, or just learning something you never knew is. Generally, but not always, attacks on "believers" are reserved for those who try to use law to mandate their view or who sell a product with no proven benefits, especially in the fields of medicine and nutrition.* Both of Music/HankGreen's Youtube science shows avert this, with SciShow focusing on science news and ideas Hank Green finds cool, while WebVideo/CrashCourse Biology, Ecology, and Chemistry taking a more targeted approach at various scientific disciplines. Part of what makes it work is Green's obvious enthusiasm* WebVideo/TheBrainScoop makes biology and taxidermy fascinating through [[{{Adorkable}} Emily Graslie's]] obvious love for discovering new things[[/folder]]

[[folder:Video Games]]* ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'' ** Mordin Solus, [[MemeticMutation the very model of a scientist Salarian]]. He shows extreme passion about his beliefs and work and has a deep appreciation of the arts. He sees the Collectors as a mockery of the Protheans, as the heart and soul of their race has long since been lost. *** He admits that after working on the Genophage, which at the time he logically saw as the correct choice, the guilt drove him to seek spiritual answers.*** The trope was invoked for laughs in the third game when he said he'd like to retire to a beach somewhere and collect seashells, only to admit he'd probably run tests on them out of boredom.* ''VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite'': N accuses Professor Juniper of "arbitrarily measuring and categorizing Pokemon without appreciating them". If you were reading Juniper's intro speech in the game's prologue, [[GenkiGirl you'd know this isn't the case]].* RivieraThePromisedLand: Ledah gave up his emotions to become a Grim Angel so he ''sounds'' like he's a straight example. The truth is the opposite; he's very passionate about his religion. [[/folder]]

[[folder:Western Animation]]* Amazo in ''JusticeLeague''. He started out as a blank-slate nanotechnology android capable of analyzing people to internally reproduce aspects of them. Lex Luthor manipulated him into doing his dirty work, and Amazo proved to be a serious threat because he could copy the powers of every superhero he encountered, then further evolve to become immune to their vulnerabilities. Eventually, he discovered Lex's manipulations, grew disillusioned, and left Earth, calling it insignificant. Some time later, after essentially evolving into a PhysicalGod, he returned to Earth, creating [[OhCrap massive panic]] among the Justice League, until it turned out he was struggling through an existential crisis, having obtained unimaginable power but not knowing what to do with it. Doctor Fate took him in, hoping to teach the android how to appreciate life and find a purpose for himself.%%* ''TheAdventuresOfJimmyNeutron'', occasionally.* On ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', the citizens of Springfield once rioted against science, saying it was like someone who spoils the end of a movie.-->'''Moe''': *fossil falls on him while he hits it* [[HypocriticalHumour I hope medical science can cure me!]]* ''WesternAnimation/DextersLaboratory'' spent a whole episode on this ("Way of the Dee Dee") where Dee Dee showed Dexter the beauties and mysteries of life (in a humorous way) after she pointed out that Dexter was deprived of life in his laboratory: "Spoiled away, alone in the dark, searching the answers to questions nobody asks... locked away from the world, never to explore the ''true'' mysteries of life". The episode ends with Dee Dee apologizing for trying to make Dexter live life her way and admitting she should've have tried to change him.* Velma in ScoobyDoo never believes the ScoobyDooHoax. In the second live action movie, she even stated that she only trusted the facts, and that finding out logical answers to problems was her true calling in life.* The '90s ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManTheAnimatedSeries'' made Peter a subversion of this {{Trope}} - for instance, when he's on a Ferris wheel, Mary Jane asks how fireworks work, at which point he goes into a talk on the fuses and the gunpowder and the doping with trace metals and so on. When Mary-Jane comments that he's taken the romance out of them by analyzing them, Peter points out that knowing how they work doesn't make them any less beautiful. [[ChekhovsLecture She would later use the knowledge to create a makeshift distress signal.]]* The Disney cartoon ''WesternAnimation/DonaldInMathmagicLand'' is an attempt to avert this. Despite Donald's insistence that advanced mathematics is for "eggheads", a [[{{Narrator}} disembodied "Spirit of Adventure"]] manages to convince him otherwise by showing how math influences things like parlor games and music theory.* ''TwasTheNightBeforeChristmas'': This is the message of the "Give Your Heart a Try" number though the later song "Hope and Hurry" does a lot to balance it out.* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'', ** Twilight is essentially a scholar of magic (and is fairly interested in history). She is repeatedly enthusiastic about her studies to the point of [[{{Adorkable}} adorkability]] and is regularly disappointed and [[FelonyMisdemeanor occasionally shocked]], when others don't show the same level of interest in these things as she does.** ''Feeling Pinkie Keen'' is a BaseBreaker, in part, because of this trope. It is the first to feature [[SpiderSense The Pinkie Sense]] and Twilight tries to figure out how it works. She questions Pinkie about its mechanics, hooks her up to a machine, and then observes her to collect empirical data. The problem was she didn't want to ''study'' this new and fascinating magic but rather ''disprove'' it because she believed it to be closer to superstitution than magic. In the end she decides to give up and stop trying to figure out how it works. * In ''WesternAnimation/YoungJustice'' this is how Kid Flash is portrayed in the episode "Denial", constantly explaining away everything done with magic, with science. In the [=DCU=], this is ''stupid'' because magic is common in this verse and several members of the Justice League use magic, such as Zatanna and her father. His perception is likely owed to the fact that the Flash family doesn't really have any magical villains, including Abra Kadabra who uses technological tricks to perform his seeming magic and was probably who Kid Flash had in mind when going through one of his diatribes (Klarion the Witch Boy, who is spying on the group, even asks Abra, "Isn't that how you perform your tricks?")

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Real Life]]* Experts in real life frequently invert this trope. These people chose these fields in the first place because they feel intensely about them. You don't get rich researching science. It is, almost of necessity, a labor of love.** Ask any Scientist about their field of specialty, and the ''last'' thing you'll get is a robotically dull answer.** Try asking a botanist about flowers, or an astronomer about galaxies.** Ask a philosopher some question and grab a seat. There are philosophers who debate with all the zeal of the most devoted {{Fan Wank}}er. Philosophy, (systematic) theology, and other exercises of raw reason are often enlightening once you've grappled with a particular problem and, as it were, solved the riddle, or at least contributed towards understanding it more. ** Ask a ''mathematician'' about their work, aka "[[EverybodyHatesMathematics the dullest thing in existence]]", and you're likely to get a whole lot of enthusiasm and excitement.-->'''Creator/BertrandRussell''', ''Study of Mathematics'': Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty, a beauty cold and austere, like that of sculpture, without appeal to any part of our weaker nature, without the gorgeous trappings of painting or music, yet sublimely pure, and capable of a stern perfection such as only the greatest art can show. The true spirit of delight, the exaltation, the sense of being more than Man, which is the touchstone of the highest excellence, is to be found in mathematics as surely as in poetry.-->'''Galileo Galilei''': Philosophy is written in that great book which ever lies before our eyes--I mean the universe--but we cannot understand it if we do not first learn the language and grasp the symbols, in which it is written. This book is written in the mathematical language... without which one wanders in vain through a dark labyrinth.** Mathematics, pure mathematics, is as much an art as it is a science. Theorems are astoundingly beautiful, if looked at the right way. The way high-school math is taught does not foster this perspective.** The very concept of "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_beauty mathematical beauty]]" not only [[DefiedTrope defies]] this trope, but [[InvertedTrope turns it on its head]]. People who aren't mathematically minded miss out on the beauty of something like Euler's identity, e[[superscript:iπ]]+1=0.[[note]]Think of it this way. When you start school, you learn about the number one, and about addition. Zero and multiplication come a little later. Then advance a few years and discover pi, and exponentiation. Finally, at the tail end of a high school education, you learn about natural logarithms and e, and complex numbers and i. Then you discover this little identity that pulls together more than a decade of diverse mathematical studies into one essentially simple expression. That's mathematical beauty.[[/note]]** Physicians can be particularly passionate about their field, sitting where it does at the intersection of cutting edge technology, the frontier of science, and a deep humanitarian mission. Dr. Atul Gawande's ''Complications'' is an excellent introduction to just how emotional the field is.* You needn't be an expert to get the feel for the inversion, either. Take trees: If you know next to nothing about them, you'll probably be able to distinguish two general types (evergreens and deciduous, roughly those that don't go bald in winter and those that do), and maybe pick out a couple specific types like maple and willow. Staring at the top of a forest is just a mass of green, nothing exciting or interesting about it. But start to study trees, to recognize the distinctions, to tell them apart from up close and then from farther away, and you start to pick out the fuzzy look of the longer needles on a pine, the bendy top and airy branches of a hemlock, the color of a Colorado blue spruce, the way the branches hang on a false cedar, the way the ground is littered with distinctive cones under a Douglasfir. And that's just the conifers/evergreens. When you have that much in your head, take a look at a forest again: Still just a mass of indistinguishable green?* Brian Cox (the physicist, not the actor) has made a career of defying this trope, in much the same vein as Professor Sagan.* Learning a language usually changes the way you perceive it. Some don't like how it sounds after their lessons and some come to like even more. * Ever see a cool magic trick? ** Some people find they are not that amusing when you figure out how they work. If you're the kind of person who legitimately enjoys magic shows, better hope you don't find yourself sitting next to that one asshole in the audience who feels the need to explain how every trick is done to you, or if he doesn't know decides to grumble and complain about how juvenile it is. ** On the other hand, some people find far more fascination in the intricacies of how the tricks are executed.** Simple kiddie tricks may lose their awesomeness, yes, but more advanced tricks of master magicians can become even more amazing when you start to understand how much brilliance, hard work, and showmanship skill go into them.** ''Creator/PennAndTeller'' had a show in the UK called "Fool Us." It was a competition. P&T would sit in the audience and see a trick one time from the audience's point of view. They got no help. No special camera angles, no tapes to watch, and only one performance of the trick. If they could not figure out how your trick was done on a single viewing, you won a trip to Vegas and the right to open for them. The acts were all top notch, and yet maybe only one in six got past them. That did not stop them from taking almost childish joy in each performer's tricks.*** Performer Michael Vincent, in particular - he was on the show twice, both times doing card tricks. Penn & Teller figured out how he did them easily, but they still not only raved about his performances, but you can tell that they're trying (without giving away how the trick is done) to explain to the audience just how amazingly talented the man is - he may be "only" doing the real basics of magic, but he is doing them so phenomenally well that these two lifelong professionals are utterly in awe of his ability, since they know just how hard it is to do what he's doing, and to make it look easy. At one point, Penn even knows exactly when and where he moves the cards to secretly get them somewhere else, and he ''still'' can't see him doing the move.* Paul "Hungrybear9562" Vasquez's "Double Rainbow" viral video has been subject to this, especially after it was autotuned by Songify This. As the man himself explained in multiple interviews (as well as a video response to his own video), his asking "What does it mean?" in the video was actually him seeking ''spiritual'' meaning in the rainbow sighting. Despite this, several science-related YouTube channels (and ''dozens'' of people commenting on his original video as well as the autotuned version) decided to "answer" his question with a detached, academic, and dry explanation on how rainbows occur.** Riot Games--which has several employees holding doctorates in the sciences--even got in on the marigold-measuring act with one of the "joke" lines Lux (a magician who specializes in spells involving light) says in ''VideoGame/LeagueOfLegends''. Much to Paul Vasquez's dismay, the amount of people trying to explain to him how rainbows occur has gotten even ''more'' obnoxious than before.* Animators spend all day sitting at a desk, studying how a body moves, how things move, making them move, drawing hundreds of drawings. Learning how it works systematically. It doesn't make it any less enjoyable to watch cartoons being able to spot where other animators went the extra mile, or made mistakes, or knowing what needs to be done to accomplish what happened.** Also, analysing people's movements make you realise just how different each person moves and how it reflects their personality, mood etc. Whereas most people would have the default assumption that "a walk is a walk," a walk in animation tells you EVERYTHING.*** The same applies to acting, whether it's a live action role, or a voice role. How does your character walk? Does he slump forward? Does he swagger? Is he pigeon toed? Does he have a particular accent? How strong is it? Is he trying to lose it? Does he have a soft voice, or a gravelly rasp? All of these little things change who he is, and how he's perceived. It's why the school of method acting still exists. People spend months getting into, and building their idea of who the character is, ''because it matters to them''.* Film ** Film students often claim to be unable to enjoy films to a full degree because they're too busy analyzing them.** Joaquin Phoenix commented on this shortly before the Oscars, saying that he rarely watches film anymore, due to knowing every trick and method that drives actors forward.* Nathaniel Wyeth came from a very artistically inclined family (son of N.C., brother of Andrew and Henriette), but as an engineer he was probably the family black sheep. Nonetheless, he was pretty good at it, eventually becoming the chief engineer of the [=DuPont=] company. (Among his inventions was PET, the plastic used in [[http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/wyeth.html soda bottles]].) True to his genes, he would speak eloquently about using equations the way Andrew uses brushes.* Emile Cioran, one of the bleakest nihilistic writers of all time, once said "Lucidity is the only vice which makes us free — free in a desert."* Richard Feynman also was a major advocate of this style of thinking. In ''What Do ''You'' Care What Other People Think?'', he advocates this position with an argument he had with an artist:-->'''Feynman:''' I have a friend who's an artist, and he sometimes takes a view which I don't agree with. He'll hold up a flower and say, "Look how beautiful it is," and I'll agree. But then he'll say, "I, as an artist, can see how beautiful a flower is. But you, as a scientist, take it all apart and it becomes dull." I think he's kind of nutty. [...] There are all kinds of interesting questions that come from a knowledge of science, which only adds to the excitement and mystery and awe of a flower. It only adds. I don't understand how it subtracts.* After he received stories of people disillusioned by his book ''The Selfish Gene'', RichardDawkins wrote a counter to this viewpoint in the form of ''Unweaving The Rainbow''. It helped that not only did most people criticize ''The Selfish Gene'' purely from title alone, but those that did actually read it thought that he was endorsing a bleak [[SocialDarwinist dog-eat-dog]] philosophy of the world[[note]] The full argument being that, as humans, we are more than our genes, i.e. even if our genes program us to be selfish we can choose otherwise[[/note]], despite the fact that [[CriticalResearchFailure he explicitly said he wasn't doing this in the first chapter of the book]]. He also added a preface with that message when he found out the executives behind the ENRON scandal had cited the book as an excuse for their behavior.

* David Kushner's book ''Masters of Doom'' has this to say about id software's John Carmack and his programming knowledge: ''"...after so many years immersed in the science of graphics, he had achieved an almost Zen-like understanding of his craft...Rather than detaching him from the natural world, this viewpoint only made him appreciate it more deeply. "These are things I find enchanting and miraculous," he said. "I don't have to be at the Grand Canyon to appreciate the way the world works, I can see that in reflections of light in my bathroom."'' In further context, this could also be a CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming for Carmack, who, up until that point, was said to have appeared impassive to his peers most of the time.** This can happen to many a game developer as their careers progress. Entering the industry with a fans appreciation, learning how it all works and forgetting how to enjoy games, and then later, learning to appreciate even more what it takes to make a game. Some of the simplest and most successful games have come from people with years of experience in the industry.* Stephen Hawking complained about this once: with the discovery of the "God Particle", he complained that, with lots of questions in physics revealed, it took away all the mystery.* The Discovery Channel is dedicated to measuring marigolds (some might say [[NetworkDecay it used to be]]), but that didn't keep them from celebrating [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=at_f98qOGY0 how awesome the world can be]].* This is one of the crux points of the CasualCompetitiveConflict on the Casual side. If you're [[VideoGame/SuperSmashBros counting all the frame data and complaining about glitches being taken out instead of watching Mario beat up Sonic]], how can you really be enjoying the game? Competitive players will be glad to retort that their deeper understanding of the game creates a more exciting scene not just to play, but to watch as well, and can greatly increase the shelf life of a game which would otherwise stagnate.[[/folder]]